Pittock Mansion Hike

Overview

This easily accessible in-town hike in Macleay Park features a charming creek, a lush forest with some old-growth Douglas-firs and Portland's tallest tree, and a Victorian-era mansion with an expansive view over downtown Portland and on to Mount Hood. The walk echoes with names from Portland's early settlers: Henry Pittock, publisher of the Daily Oregonian; Danford Balch, property owner and first man hanged for murder in Portland; Lafe Pence, who tried to wash away whole hillsides to fill a swamp for development; and Donald Macleay, Scottish merchant and banker. On the north slopes of Pittock Hill, you can make a loop, going and coming, using the Upper Macleay and Macleay Trails. A shorter option that leaves out Balch Creek can begin at either the Macleay Park Trailhead or the Tunnel Trailhead, both on Cornell Road. Note that the Lower Macleay Trail is universal access as far as a stone viewing platform on Balch Creek. Begin at the Lower Macleay Park Trailhead, and walk under the Thurman Street Bridge (originally called the Balch Gulch Bridge), a truss bridge of the Pratt type erected in 1905, towards a red metal sculpture where the Lower Macleay Trail begins. As you approach the canyon, notice on your left a massive wooden grate - called a debris rack - where Balch Creek enters a seven-foot diameter storm sewer leading to an unnoticeable outlet near the shipping yards on the Willamette River. What a rather humble ending to the very charming creek which you will see as you walk upstream! Pass a sign about Macleay Park, donated in 1897 by Donald Macleay. Then there is an elaborate but rickety walkway above "nets" that catch debris before it clogs the sewer pipe. In the same area, Lafe Pence built his flume and used hydraulic hoses to blast off soil from Balch Canyon to silt up Guilds Lake, now a flat and dry industrial expanse, for development. Enter Balch Canyon, which looks very natural but was somewhat altered by Pence's depredations (although the project was abandoned before an environmental Armageddon to

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